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By Debra Goldschmidt
CNN Medical

(CNN) -- During Hanukkah, Jewish people celebrate the miracle of the tiny bit of oil that miraculously burned for eight days. This miracle is remembered by lighting a menorah for eight days and eating fare cooked in oil or laden with cheese. These foods help Jews enjoy their celebration, but some may say they should come with a warning about the high amounts of fat.

To lighten the issue, author Penny Wantuck Eisenberg has come up with ways to enjoy the holiday with the same traditional foods while cutting the fat. Her book, "Light Jewish Holiday Desserts," contains recipes using fat-reduction techniques she learned from reading some already published low-fat cookbooks.

Although she had made many low-fat meals, she hadn't really tried making low-fat desserts and was unsure if she could create dependable alternatives for her book.

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Eisenberg's two favorite Hanukkah desserts are cheesecake and sufgoniyot (Israeli doughnuts). She admits she prefers fried foods to baked.

She says her recipe for baked sufgoniyot is not the same as fried, but "it's a good fake" and you can eat more of them because each only contains two grams of fat.

Eisenberg has created a recipe for low-fat fried sufgoniyot also. Techniques include combining types of flour in specific amounts and baking the cheesecake in a water bath.

Properly following the techniques is imperative for the desserts to taste like their full-fat counterparts. Otherwise, you may end up with a curdled cheesecake or heavy sufgoniyot, not to mention a higher fat content.

Because of her preference for fried foods, Eisenberg offers these tips to lower the fat when frying: Make sure food for frying is very lean, and blot fried foods well with a paper towel.

"People don't realize how much oil drains off," she says.

She also says to make sure the oil is between 375 and 400 degrees Fahrenheit because the hotter the oil, the less it is absorbed into the food.